


Strangers to Blue Water

by orphan_account



Category: Kingdom Hearts
Genre: Aged-Up Character(s), Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Politics, American Politics, M/M, North Carolina, Slow Burn, Social Media
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-12-23
Updated: 2019-01-14
Packaged: 2019-09-25 07:03:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 11,627
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17116673
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: [aged-up characters]  In an Appalachian town, Roxas is desperate to restart his life. His bills are mounting, and despite his parents' political careers flourishing, it's all Roxas can do to keep his head above the water. But that also means taking up the most thankless, disgusting job for miles: a line cook position at the dingiest, most remote bar in town. He soon finds himself trying to win the trust of Axel, whose suspicions about Roxas's identity only intensify as they scrub floors, kick out drunks, and handle the bar manager's sinister treatment of his staff. As Roxas attempts to run from his own past, he finds himself caught in unbreakable cycles, ones that have far greater implications than he could have ever imagined. [slow-burn AU]





	1. The Opened Window

**Author's Note:**

> Heads up for some gross food and bug stuff, so if that is super not your jam, then this fic might not be for you, as it does partly take place in a pretty nasty bar. Roxas has been aged up to twenty-two. Also, I want to emphasize that this is very much a slow-burn fic, meaning that I have a lot of chapters planned out (at least five), and the romantic stuff is going to take a while to ramp up. Hopefully it'll be worth the wait. Thanks. —Cedar

I was preparing to set candy out for trick-or-treaters when my phone buzzed with a notification. I wanted my house to be a real diamond in the rough this season and had filled up a plastic bucket with fun-size Snickers, Reeses, and Three Musketeers. Kids with peanut allergies were probably fucked, but hopefully all the other neighborhood urchins would appreciate the gesture, and I would be crowned the Cool Young Guy of the block.

I eagerly checked my phone, leaning against a rotting pillar that barely held the leaking roof up over my front porch. Hopefully parents wouldn’t consider my house to be a safety hazard and would actually let their children approach it from the street. This was North Carolina, after all, deep in the backwoods of Boone, where the people were much more laid-back and resourceful than folks who lived further south. I would know, considering my upbringing took place far from this sleepy town.

Hopefully this notification would alert me of a new reporting project. I desperately needed a new assignment; I’d spent the past several days slumped over on the couch, scrolling through Instagram and watching the same gaming streams over and over again.

 

 **IMMEDIATE ACTION REQUIRED!  
** **Your account has been overdrawn.  
** **To avoid overdraft fees, please settle your outstanding charges and call our customer service line at…**

 

I stopped reading. I could feel a migraine beginning to brew behind my eyes.

As I turned to head back into the house, I knocked into the bucket of candy, sending a hundred miniature treats flying across the porch. Too exhausted to even cry at this point, I knelt down to clean up the mess, already wondering if the $6.99 purchase had been worth it.

 

* * *

 

“I’d like to speak to the manager, please.”

“This is she. Can I help you?”

I hadn’t expected the manager to be the one answering the phone. It really goes to show how much I knew about restaurants in the area, especially those smaller than my own house.

“Uh, yeah, hi. My name is Roxas. I’m in a little bit of a situation—”

After that call, I learned not to lead with the “situation” line. Drugs were becoming a big problem in the area, and the last thing I wanted was to make a potential employer think that I was injecting away the generous tips of the humble folks of Boone.

I made another call.

“Hi, I was hoping I could talk about lending a hand in your kitchen. Hm? No sir, I don’t have any experience in fine dining...”

“Happy Halloween! Oh, er, I’m sorry—I didn’t realize—I’m not interested in, uh, church right now—”

“Hey there, I heard you guys have some of the best barbecue in town, and well, uh, I’m a vegetarian, but I love baked beans—”

I was fucking this up really bad.

Night was beginning to fall. I peeked out my window and could see the flickering lights of approaching families’ cell phones. I kept the blinds closed, no longer excited about my status as the Cool Guy of the neighborhood. The candy was there for kids to help themselves—I was all about the honor system (and, frankly not having to open the damn door every five minutes).

I had a sinking feeling in my stomach again. I had to make one last attempt to scrounge up some money before I started bouncing bills.

I already had my jacket on and was pulling my boots over my feet, hardly able to contain my jitters. I’d made a total of ten unsuccessful phone calls today and hadn’t even thought of the most obvious place to inquire about a job.

I left out the back door, already familiar with the quickest way to reach my destination. The icy air stung my cheeks; Boone was already heading into its long, dark winter. The forest behind me had the look of a wicked setting from a Gothic fairy tale. The long needles of tall pine trees were black against the purple evening sky, and moss-covered rocks decorated the forested hills further than the eye could see. But I’d lived here long enough to know that if I cut through the woods, then ascended a treacherously steep hill, I would make it to the Peculiar River around the time the dive bar was set to open.

I’d never been to the Peculiar River, but as I trekked through the autumn woods, I thought back to all the stories I’d heard about it. Well, they were things I’d overheard about it, more like, as I didn’t really have any friends in the area.

A few months back, I’d been waiting in line at the grocery store behind a pair of women who were talking about the bar. Their description piqued my interest, and I’d wondered about the bar ever since.

“You know, they really should do something about their decor,” one woman had said to her friend. “The food is pretty decent for the price, but goddamn, do they have to have all those dead animals all over the place?”

“You think the owner maybe has a taxidermy business on the side?” her friend asked. “I know there are quite a few good ones ’round here. Maybe he’s just no good at it.”

“Or she,” her companion corrected.

“Whatever. But I see what you mean. I’ve only been there once, and it’s hard to enjoy a nice Irish coffee when there’s a poor critter staring at you from a foot away.”

The Peculiar River sounded like the worst kind of place for me and my animal-loving bleeding heart. However, it seemed like it just might be weird enough to take a chance on an underemployed twenty-two-year-old who was up to his ears in debt. Plus, what kind of name was the Peculiar River? Whoever owned this place had to be some kind of mountain man (or woman) who descended from the hills every morning with a fishing pole or a hunting rifle. Walking through the woods and crawling through the brush before asking for a job could probably only help my chances, if that was the case. I had neglected to grab a hat on my way out, so I’m sure my hair was standing up in a thousand different directions, maybe twisting itself into its own little yellow horns.

The bar proved to be a further trek than I had anticipated. While the evening sky had still glowed with the waning light of day when I’d left my house, it was now a thick blanket of black, with shining holes of starlight pricked through. The moon was hidden behind the trees, but I was able to light the rest of my trip by using the flashlight on my phone. Several times I thought about turning back, but the knowledge that I would just be hit with email after email from my bank in the coming days pushed me onward. I walked as if on autopilot, lifting each heavy boot with the conviction that I was _not_ under _any_ circumstances going to all this trouble without getting at least a shift washing dishes.

As I made my way through the trees, I began to make out the warm light of the bar’s windows. I struggled to the top of the hill, upon which it sat contentedly radiating heat and light, as I tripped and stumbled my way across rocks and gravel to get to the top. Where on earth was the parking lot for this place? This couldn’t possibly be safe for many people; couldn’t the owner have installed a wheelchair ramp at least?

The Peculiar River seemed even sadder and dumpier as I approached its front doors. The building had clearly once been some kind of stable or farmhouse, though why someone would build such a structure at the top of a hill is beyond me. The handle on the front door was wet with something when I reached out to open it, so I gingerly folded my sleeve over my palm and used it as a barrier between the skin on my hand and the Peculiar River’s peeling, damp door.

As I stepped inside, a wave of noises hit me. The bar was absolutely _packed_ with people. Some were standing against the wall, nursing local beers as they played pool on a worn table. Others gathered around the bar itself, jostling one another as they fought for the bartender’s attention. But most people were seated at the high tables situated helter-skelter around the place, their jackets hung on the backs of their chairs as they leaned over their tables to share threats, gossip, or stolen kisses.

Unsure of where exactly I should be headed, I squeezed my way around and made my way toward the bar, which was in the back of the building. String lights hung from the rafters, making the atmosphere seem cozy, but this effect was undercut by the dingy smell of cigarette smoke and cheap beer. And the women I had eavesdropped on a few months earlier had been right; taxidermied animals were scattered throughout the bar, including a menacing-looking stuffed vulture mounted on one of the walls. I noticed a patchy cougar in the corner that was knocked over, and at a table near the front, someone had stuck a cigarette in the gaping mouth of a screaming raccoon.

Luckily, I didn’t have to wander through Zoology 201 to get to where I needed to go. Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed a door to my right. It was covered in heinous replicas of Renaissance paintings, including a print-out of the Mona Lisa, who’d had her smooth forehead vandalized with a drawing of two enormous breasts, their nipples pointing in different directions. But above this distasteful interpretation of Da Vinci was the one word I needed to see.

_Office._

I made my way over to the door and, thinking about my tragic bank account, knocked.

Much like the first call I’d made that day, the answer was swifter than I’d been expecting. The door opened, and I found myself staring into the chest of a man who was at the very least a foot taller than me. His blue eyes were narrowed in annoyance, but what caught my attention was his head of rose-pink hair, which had been cut into shaggy waves around his face. He was dressed in all black.

It was very punk rock. It was not very W-2.

I must have taken me too long to muster up the gumption to speak, as the man who had opened the door took one suspicious look at me and said, “There a problem out here?”

His voice was deeper than I’d expected. I shook my head no.

“Hi! Uh, my name’s Roxas, and I need a helping hand—ah, was wondering if you needed a helping hand, here. Tonight. Er, sorry, it’s kind of an emergency?” I could feel myself getting more flustered as I spoke, the blood rushing to my face, which was already paler than usual after months of shutting myself away in a crappy mountain cottage.

The man—I assumed he was the manager—put a hand on one hip.

“I don’t understand,” he said, his voice flat.

I rocked back on my heels, stuffing my hands in the pockets of my jacket. I must’ve looked like a twelve-year-old, and my intimidating height of five-foot-five couldn’t have helped matters.

“I wanted to know if I could work a bit tonight and make some extra cash. I’m clean, I promise,” I added.

The manager exhaled, rolling his eyes.

“Come inside.”

I followed him into his office, which was surprisingly much cleaner and brighter than I’d been expecting, based on the condition of the rest of the bar. The white walls gleamed, and I was struck by the number of plants placed artfully throughout the place, tendrils of ivy descending over a tall file cabinet and coming to rest on the pristine white desk that sat in the middle of the room. The scent of roses drifted into my nose.

Much more relaxed, I sank into a black chair that the manager offered after he had closed the door. I expected him to sit down across from me, but he remained standing, one hip cocked to the side.

“So you need cash tonight.”

“Yessir.”

A smile pulled at the corner of his lips.

“Have you worked in food service before?”

“No sir. I mean, I can cook! I actually cook every—”

“Do you have good eyesight?”

I blinked. What would eyesight have to do with working in a restaurant? Did he think I had problems with my vision? I didn’t even wear glasses.

“Yeah, my eyesight is pretty good.”

“Do you have allergies?”

I started to feel uneasy. These questions were, without a doubt, bona fide illegal for an employer to ask. But for some reason, it didn’t feel as though the manager—or owner, or whatever he was—was looking to deny me employment. His tone was curt, but his eyes sparkled.

“Ah, no.” Maybe he knew that I’d left out peanut-allergy-unfriendly candy for trick-or-treaters tonight.

 _Stop being so stupid,_ I thought. _This is how you wound up broke in the first place. For once, be grateful for any shred of mercy you get._

“I think we can find the perfect role for you.”

“Really?” I jumped out of my chair, already extending my hand. The manager looked at it, but he didn’t extend his own.

“You’ll probably want to take your jacket off. You might get...messy.”

“No problem.” I shimmied out of my jacket, which left me in just a gray t-shirt. Luckily, it didn’t say anything stupid on it or advertise some woo-woo Californian skate company.

“Follow me.”

The manager led me back out into the crowded restaurant. Credence Clearwater Revival blared on a staticy speaker system. The noise made me wince a bit, but I figured, hey, if a staff of who knows how many people can work here for several hours a night, then why couldn’t I?

The manager led me behind the bar and unlocked a side door, which opened into a dingy kitchen and attached scullery. The bulbs buzzed and flickered, and the men working at the grill to sizzle burgers and sling late-night breakfast specials didn’t so much as look up at me as we entered. One of the workers was staffing the sink, where I assumed I’d be spending my night.

“Hey, I’m—”

“Hush,” the manager said, leading me to a small, rickety door in the corner of the scullery. “This is the pantry. This is where you’ll be tonight.”

“Oh, um, OK,” I answered. “What needs to be done in the pantry? Organizing?”

The manager didn’t answer. He reached for a box of gloves and handed me a pair, and then he pulled a grimy-looking plastic bag out of another box.

“We’ve got a bit of a problem,” he said. “Yesterday, when one of our line cooks checked the pantry, he noticed that someone had left a window open. The people who work here are fucking braindead. But that’s not your problem tonight.” He waved me into the pantry, which also had a buzzing, flickering light fixture. The pantry looked pretty standard to me, apart from its unfortunate lighting, but a terrible smell immediately assaulted my nose. “Your problem is these.”

The manager was leaned next to a large bucket. He peeled back its red lid, and I felt myself wretch by instinct. My knees felt weak, and I leaned against the shelves behind me to keep from falling over.

Inside the bucket was a red, sticky liquid, which I later learned was some kind of syrup. Why it wasn’t stored away from all the other food was beyond me, but I wasn’t there to “reorganize” the pantry. Based on what I saw moving and bubbling up in the container, I was there to purge it of some kind of maggot infestation.

But first, I had some purging of my own to do, right into the corner of the dank little pantry that I would have to spend the rest of the night in.

“Cash, right?” the manager said as I tried to straighten up, my gloved hands splayed against the wall. “I can pay you by two. You’ve got six hours. And clean up that corner. We have safety standards here. You wouldn’t want anyone to get sick, would you?”

 

* * *

 

I would be lying if I said I didn’t cry a little bit that night. Honestly, as humiliating as cleaning a bucket of syrup full of flies and maggots is, eventually I stopped feeling quite so disgusted. I actually started to get pretty good at it after a while, once I had become desensitized to how positively vile the task was.

I was finished in only four hours instead of six, but because I wanted to be paid for the whole night, I decided to check on the other containers of food in the pantry (after I had removed my gloves and scrubbed my hands raw, of course, much to the chagrin of the dishes guy). Everything else looked fine, but I’m sure that not one inch of that pantry would have passed a Gordon Ramsey inspection. The Roxas inspection was a lot easier to pass, since it was predicated on my being the one doing the work and having little to no investment in the well-being of the patrons of the Peculiar River.

It was hard for me to feel bad for anyone, really, that night. Not only was the work itself humiliating, but the circumstances that had led to it were ones that I didn’t dare tell a soul. It’s weird enough explaining to your parents that you want to work for skate magazines for a living—now imagine that your parents are powerful players in the political world. The kind of people who get up on stages and speak to the pantry-scrubbers of the world about how they could fix their lives, provided they vote correctly. Well, if their fuck-up son was anything to go by, those promises are awfully hard to keep.

What should have been a fun night of handing out candy was totally wrecked by that one automated email. No one on earth knew that I’d overdrawn my bank account, no one but me. And yet, shame burned deep in my belly, launching me into a cycle of self-pitying thoughts. If I’d learned one thing from working in entertainment—especially after having dipped my toes in the cesspool of online video content—it’s that nothing is ever truly private. It’s never a matter of _if_ other people find out; it’s only a matter of _when_.

I still remember the night I came home from a friend’s house, well past my curfew, stinking to high heaven of the “devil’s root.” My parents had been absolutely furious, and my mom had even cried. This could ruin us, it could wreck our careers. What if someone found out?

Unluckily for me, no one ever really found out about my pot-smoking—or if they did, no one really cared. This was unlucky because what _was_ uncovered about me happened to be a lot worse, the circumstances around it so unfortunate and ill-timed that it’s honestly almost hilarious when I think about it.

When you harbor secrets, you’re vulnerable to blackmail. When you are inevitably blackmailed, you find yourself in an even more treacherous situation while trying to cover up evidence of any wrongdoing. I’m certain that when people think about political corruption, they likely think of conniving old men with greedy eyes. They don’t think about a stupid kid who happened to be born into a family more powerful than it had any right to be.

Hence, Boone. It was a cheap enough place to live and isolated without being, you know, completely doomsday-prepper middle of nowhere. I knew no one here, and it was a mostly sleepy little college town. People weren’t uptight, and the food was good. I couldn’t ask for much more—except a paycheck.

At two, the manager found me in the pantry, straightening up some of the food containers.

“Throw out that syrup,” he said.

I didn’t argue. Fishing bugs out of syrup didn’t suddenly make it edible. I wasn’t even mad about all the wasted labor—hell, unlike my writing jobs, I didn’t have to worry about an editor rejecting my work and demanding I do better.

“I’m surprised it took you all night,” he said.

“I was careful,” I answered, picking up the bucket and carrying it into the scullery. I set it down beside a large gray trash can. “It’s important to me to do a good job.”

“It’s important to be fast. This isn’t a fucking daycare,” the manager shot back, his eyes narrowing.

Too exhausted to argue, I merely nodded.

“Which is why I’m letting you collect a portion of the staff’s tips tonight. I already told them about it. They’re not too thrilled, but considering your situation, I thought this would be the best way to ensure that you got what you came for.” He raised an eyebrow, smirking. “Can’t say you’re the only back-of-house boy we’ve had who likes being sticky.”

I wasn’t sure how to reply, so I merely looked at him. It occurred to me that I didn’t even know his name—though it seemed weird to follow up his obviously gross comment with a personal question.

The manager motioned behind himself. “Go out to the bar, and tell Axel you’re clocking out. He’ll give you what you’re owed. Then come see me in my office.”

And with that, the manager turned on his heel and exited the pantry and then the kitchen, his steps silent and swift. I looked back over at the other people working; only two men remained, their backs to me as they scrubbed the night’s dishes.

I slipped out the door and entered the front of the house, suddenly shocked at how dark and eerie the bar seemed when it was empty. I could see the silhouettes of two men outside the window, smoking cigarettes and speaking in hushed voices. A slender woman was wiping down some of the tables, while another staff member fixed up the pool table and searched for a cue stick that had gone missing.

I ambled over to the bar, not sure if it would be OK for me to be behind the worn mahogany counter. Instead, I stood awkwardly near the side of the bar, wishing I had my jacket so that I could fidget with its drawstrings. I could only see the figure of someone hunched over, far on the other side of the bar, reorganizing beer bottles in a mini fridge. Each vertebra strained against his black T-shirt, giving him the look of some kind of crested animal or dinosaur—especially considering his hair. I’d never seen anything like it. It was styled into huge red spikes that hung off the back of his head, swinging around his neck and pointy shoulders as he jostled beer bottles around in the fridge.

He eventually straightened up, standing about as tall as the manager had, although his body was significantly slimmer. His legs, clad in black pants, looked like two long, bent cigarettes, and his shoulder blades strained against his shirt just as much as his spine had a moment ago.

“Excuse me, “ I said, summoning my most curt voice. “Are you Axel?”

He turned around.

“Yeah. You must be Barbie Dream Maggot.”

His eyes were a brilliant green, lined heavily in black and almond shaped, giving his already angular face a someone catlike appearance. His voice, much smoother than the manager’s, even sounded like a low purr. Two tattoos sat on the tops of his cheeks, one beneath each emerald-colored eye.

He was the most bizarre-looking person I had ever laid eyes on.

“Is that what you’ve all been calling me?” I asked, immediately feeling pathetic as soon as I’d said it. “I, er, my name’s—”

“Don’t care,” Axel answered, waving his hand. “I busted my ass tonight, and frankly you’re lucky I don’t bust yours for skimming the top off everyone’s tips. On a motherfucking holiday, no less.”

“Do you always pool your tips?” I asked, my voice meeker than I had intended.

“Last I checked, we live in a capitalist hellscape, not the Hundred Acre Wood. Yeah, we pool our fucking tips.”

I shut up, half considering just walking out right then and there. Maybe I could just come back and collect my wages the next day.

Axel had already pooled the staff’s tips together by now, which he kept in a pouch beneath the register. He opened it, counted out a few bills, and slapped them down on the bar.

“Here’s your trick-or-treat money.”

I shuffled over to the money from the front of the bar, not even giving Axel so much as a goodbye before I had snatched the bills. I made my way over to the manager’s door and knocked.

“You running to tattle on me to Marluxia?” Axel called after me, laughing. “Did I hurt your little feelings by not playing nice?”

The manager—Marluxia—seemed to be in a much better mood when he opened the door to the office and let me step inside.

“Don’t worry about Axel,” he said, handing me my jacket. “He’s the most obnoxious person working here. I’d fire him if he wasn’t so damn reliable, unless most of these ugly troglodytes.”

“Uh—”

“Tomorrow, I expect you here by six. Wear all black.” He ran a hand through his hair and looked me up and down. “You’re the puniest creature I’ve ever seen. Not sure if we have an apron that’ll fit. Maybe bring a towel you can tie around your waist.”

I nodded. I didn’t own an apron. I didn’t really own a towel, either. Why use an extra piece of fabric to dry off if you could just as well get into your clothes right away? Especially if your clothes are just pajamas 99 percent of the time.

“Do I need an ID or—”

“Jesus, are you a lawyer? Don’t worry about any of that. I don’t care.”

“But isn’t it illegal to—”

“Yes.”

I stopped talking. Without counting it, I pocketed my pay for the night and thanked Marluxia. He shut the door without a word.

 

* * *

 

I still don’t know why I couldn’t bring myself to cry on my walk home. I’d never experienced anything so bizarre and abusive in my entire life. And yet, they’d paid me right away, without even wanting to know my name or anything about me. This was probably the most illegal and divey establishment in the mountains, but hell, it helped me get that much closer to keeping my crumbling house.

The candy bucket was a quarter full when I got home. Maybe I would be the Cool Guy after all—and I deserved a Snickers anyway.

Once I was inside and sprawled on my couch, I took the money out of my pocket and counted it up. Immediately, I regretted not having stayed longer at the bar to argue for more pay or perhaps to have assisted more with closing. I held a paltry $40 in my hands, which would be enough to pay my bank’s overdraft fees but would not be enough to help me pay my bills in the coming days.

Groaning, I twisted my body around on the couch and shoved my face into a faded pillow. I don’t know how long I laid there like that, my light still on, but after a while my phone buzzed.

Knowing that my phone had been an enormous source of grief for me today, I almost didn’t look at it—but I’m shitty at self-control, and I checked it anyway.

It was from the magazine—an order to write a brief blog about some new skate clothing being released for the new season. They wanted it done in two days, and it would pay $1,000. It sounded boring, but it also sounded nonsticky.

I sent an email back to accept the assignment, then slept through the remaining hours of Halloween night.


	2. Hot Water

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading the second chapter. Just to be transparent, I don't really know what my update schedule will be like. I've been on PTO for the past two weeks, so it wasn't a huge burden of my time to get these first two chapters up. Going forward, I can't promise a consistent schedule, but I'd like to get a chapter up at least once a month.

When I was sixteen years old, my parents were the two most hated people in the state.

It all started to unravel for them when the trial began. A withered, sobbing old man took the stand as the defendant. His ravings and cries made the trial unbearable to watch, at least for me. Was he dangerous? Possibly, especially when his circumstances were taken into account. But did he deserve the death penalty?

My parents weren’t as wild as some. But they happened to be the loudest voices at a particularly bad time.

Homelessness is obviously a problem all over the country, and it’s one of those issues that most politicians don’t really have trouble discussing or addressing in their rhetoric. More money should be allocated toward programs that would help reintegrate these unfortunate folks back into the workforce. Easy-peasy.

The problem was the bookkeeping. The problem was that a little girl had died. The problem was the death threats. The radio shows. The need to pull me out of school.

The problem was that, for the first time in my life, I deeply hated my parents and their stance on this issue. I hated them for selfish reasons, not because I wanted to see a homeless man who had been convicted of the second-degree murder of a three-year-old child treated fairly by the courts. I hated them because they were supposed to be justice, they were supposed to be the adults in the room, both in my life and in the eyes of the public.

As I got older, I grew to realize that there’s no such thing as justice—just points on a timeline, the ebb and flow of cruelty lapping at the shores of an unfeeling, unthinking island.

 

* * *

 

The morning after Halloween, I woke up later than usual. It took me a moment to remember that my time working at the Peculiar River had, in fact, unfolded in reality and hadn’t been a sick dream. My clothes still smelled like cigarettes, and I still had last night’s pay stuffed into my pocket. It would be enough money to cover my overdraft fees. Until I was paid for my latest writing project, I’d have to just live off ramen noodles. At least they’d sent me a modest advance—$50—which would post to my account within the next few days.

I tried not to think about the Peculiar River that morning. Instead, I treated myself by eating the remainder of my Halloween candy and watching a few episodes of a horror TV show on Netflix. “Treating myself” had become my default mode for the past few months, as the days had begun to blur together. It made me less depressed about my situation to think of it as a “break” or “time off” to look after my mental health. My former social-media accounts and email addresses were abandoned somewhere in cyberspace, losing relevance and followers with each day that passed. And that was how I wanted it to be.

As the day slipped into late afternoon, I considered whether or not it would be wise for me to return to the Peculiar River for another shift. The place was weird, for sure, and last night’s task had been thoroughly disgusting, but when I really thought about it, I didn’t feel all _that_ humiliated. The other staff members weren’t any better than me as people. In fact, they were downright assholes.

What really confused me was the manager’s willingness to give me such a nasty job to begin with. Wouldn’t that have risked his business? And letting me work without having submitted any paperwork whatsoever—who does that?

The hours passed, and I finally decided that I didn’t really have much of a choice but to return to the bar for another shift. There was always a voice in the back of my head saying, _You don’t have to go. No one can make you do anything you don’t want to do._ I ignored it as best I could, showering and getting ready for what I figured would be a day probably just as disgusting as the day before.

Not having an apron or even so much as a towel, I made do with a faded black tool belt, which gaped open without any tools in its pockets. Even so, it had a small apron at the front, which should be good enough for me to wipe my hands—depending on whatever my hands wound up getting into that night.

At about a quarter to six, I left my house and made my way back up to the bar, rust-red leaves crunching under my boots. The woods were silent as I walked, growing darker and more sinister as I progressed. I knew I would have to start bringing a flashlight or something on my way to this place; there was no way I was going to waste phone battery on a flashlight function just so I could see where I was going.

_I’m already acting like this walk will be routine._

The second time I approached the Peculiar River’s doors, I was prepared for the flood of noise and the stench of strong perfume and beer. I took a deep breath and opened the door.

The Peculiar River seemed like a totally different establishment. Two or three Boomer-age men nursed beers at the bar in the back, and the string lights strung haphazardly across the rafters were turned off. The bar was dark, and James Taylor played on the twenty-year old speakers that had been stuffed into a few corners of the room. The taxidermied vulture glared down at me, and I noticed that it was covered in cobwebs.

It was as though all the life from the night before had been sucked out of the marrow of the place, leaving it cold and hollow.

Marluxia was waiting for me at the bar. He raised his eyebrows at my tool belt.

“You going somewhere, Property Brother?”

I just looked back at him. What did he want me to say?

Marluxia sighed and spread his hands on the bar, leaning forward to rest on them.

“Look, we need the help,” he said, “—badly. And I appreciate your commitment to doing gross shit and halfway following directions. But you look fucking ridiculous, and I can’t have that.” He sighed again. “Forget the damn apron tonight. You can just wipe your grubby paws on your pants. I don’t give a shit. You’re probably about as scrawny as Axel—see if you can get on his good side, and maybe he’ll lend you one of his aprons.”

I nodded. I had no intention of asking Axel for anything. In fact, I was already considering which grimy curtains in my house were the least nauseating and could be sewn into something that resembled an apron.

Marluxia led me back to the kitchen, which seemed even more depressing without any of the other staff members there to break up some of the dark, empty space.

“I want you back here,” he said, motioning toward the metal prep table, which stretched across the middle of the kitchen. I blinked, confused.

“You don’t want me washing dishes?”

Marluxia barked a laugh. “Hell no. Make yourself useful, and learn how to make something that isn’t a complete abomination. You have a college degree?”

I answered in the affirmative, and Marluxia’s smirk widened. “Put your expensive education to good use, then. Don’t suck.”

Marluxia fished a damp, crumpled-up menu out of a plastic file box that had been fastened to the wall. He pushed it over to me and as soon as I had picked up the paper, exited the kitchen without so much as a “good luck.”

Despite its name, the Peculiar River served no seafood. The majority of its MS Paint-designed menu was dedicated to drinks, with several food items crammed into a box in one corner of the sheet. I scanned this section, noting that everything but the pretzels and side salads contained meat. At least I wouldn’t have to worry about gaining any weight while I worked here.

Not sure when the rest of the cooks would show up that day, I decided to take a look around the kitchen and learn where things were. Unsurprisingly, nothing was labeled, so I had to cautiously peer into every bucket and tub to learn of its contents. Despite the syrup incident from the night before, the rest of the food products in the pantry and freezer seemed to be in an edible condition, with the exception of some sad-looking lettuce.

I was crouched on the floor examining the rather impressive collection of hot sauces stored on a bottom shelf when I heard the doorknob to the kitchen turn. A large, imposing man entered the kitchen, his long black dreadlocks pulled up into a ponytail on the crown of his head. Thick black sideburns hugged his square jaw, and his bushy eyebrows furrowed when he saw me there on the floor.

“I’m Roxas,” I said, my voice flat.

“Xaldin,” he answered. “You’re in the way.”

I straightened up. “Is there something I can do to help?”

Xaldin didn’t answer me right away. He ducked into the pantry and came out a second later holding a bag of potatoes.

“Cut these in half.”

“Ah, potato skins, right?” I asked, remembering the menu item. Tragically, it was not vegetarian, as the skins were stuffed with bacon and typically covered in beef gravy.

Xaldin didn’t answer.

“How many?” I followed up.

“Until I tell you to stop.”

The rest of the night consisted of more of the same type of vaguely threatening treatment from Xaldin, whose broad-shouldered, tall body was always hovering near me. Was the Peculiar River’s “peculiarity” that all of its staff members had to stand at least six feet tall? I performed menial tasks around the kitchen as Xaldin instructed, including putting frozen pretzels in the oven and dressing up hamburgers and sliders with special sauces and condiments. Luckily, I encountered no bugs or other health-code violations as I worked. Xaldin and I even wore gloves.

I couldn’t tell if Xaldin was the type of person who did everything efficiently and silently or if he was genuinely just interested in cooking. Within seconds of getting an order from the server, Xaldin would already be making room on his grill for the next greasy burger. We worked silently alongside each other, churning through tickets. I had no idea how busy the bar was that night, but based on the number of orders we got, there had to have been at least about a hundred patrons total over the course of the night.

I was surprised at how fast the night went by. No dishwashers had been scheduled for the night, so instead, servers would drop in to the scullery area to help rinse plates and silverware. Everyone fell pretty far behind with the dishes soon enough, but luckily, the kitchen was closing moments before we sent out our last clean plate. Xaldin and I then made quick work of the remaining dishes and all the cooking equipment. The skin on my hands tingled from the sting of hot water, and my clothes were filthy and half-soaked by the time we wrapped up.

I raised my hand for a high-five. Xaldin frowned at me.

Marluxia, who’d been missing in action the entire night, popped back into the scullery shortly after we’d finished. Xaldin had already snuck out the back to smoke a cigarette, while I was checking my email on my phone.

“You ready to cash out?” Marluxia asked.

“Sure,” I answered. Marluxia waved at the door.

“Same deal. Go find the skinny freak, and he’ll pay you your share of the tips.”

“Am I going to get an hourly wage?” I asked, looking up at him.

Marluxia clicked his tongue. “Of course. Did Xaldin not show you where the timesheet is? What a bastard.”

“Er, did you tell him to tell me?”

“Nope,” Marluxia answered, shrugging. “Oh well. Ask Axel.”

Truthfully, I would have taken Xaldin’s silence over Axel’s venom any day. I slid my phone into my back pocket and ventured out front of house.

Despite the steady stream of orders Xaldin and I had fielded throughout the night, the bar was pretty empty by now. Last call had been about twenty minutes ago, and most of the bar’s patrons had cleared out—where they went, I couldn’t guess.

Axel was behind the bar, scrolling through Instagram, content to ignore the pile of liquor bottles gathered in a corner that he needed to take out. Xaldin had tasked me with taking the garbage out once that night, and frankly, I couldn’t blame Axel for putting the task off. It was unbelievably cold outside, even for a November night in the mountains.

“Hey,” I said, approaching the slouching bartender. Even craned over his phone, Axel was still almost a foot taller than me. “Could I—”

“Already gotcha,” Axel said, without looking up from his phone. I couldn’t help but scowl; people who ignored you to be on their phones were the absolute worst kind of people. When I had been climbing the ranks of social-media influencers, I always made it a point not to purposely work with people who were so blatantly disrespectful. And in areas like the California coast, this meant that I worked with far fewer people than I probably should have.

Well. There were other reasons for that being the case, too.

“I also wanted to talk about last night,” I said, daring to take a step behind the bar. This still didn’t get Axel’s attention, even though I was only about two feet from him. “I don’t know if it’s you or Marluxia who deals with splitting tips and stuff, but I was hoping I could maybe work the front of the house sometime. I could really use the money.”

Axel still didn’t reply. He seemed to have switched from scrolling on Instagram to swiping on Tinder instead.

“Also, Marluxia said you should lend me an apron.”

Axel exhaled and finally looked up at me. Maybe my expression was a bit stupid-looking at that moment, because a mocking smile spread across his face.

“Yeah, I heard about how you came in ready for Tool Time today. Frankly, I’m impressed you came up with something so...technically correct, but also so unfair to Marluxia. He’d sell an organ to anyone wearing a nicely cut suit.” Axel winked. “He’s got no appreciation for scrappy losers like us.”

“I—”

“Here.” Axel reached around behind himself, sliding his phone into one of his back pockets and pulling one of the strings of his black apron loose. He crumpled it up in his hand and threw it at me. I, of course, not only fumbled to catch it, but also managed to drop it into a puddle of spilled beer on the floor.

“Once they start stocking aprons at your Build-A-Bear workshop, you can just wash that and give it back,” Axel said. “Normally I’d be more generous and let you keep it, but we’ve just burned through too many barbacks and busboys who thought we were running a punk-rock commune and not a business.”

“Speaking of business,” I started, “I also wanted to know about, like, wages. Marluxia mentioned timesheets. Do I need to bring my ID in or something or fill out some paperwork?”

Axel waved his hand. “Consider yourself ‘under the table’ for the time being. Honestly, it’ll make life easier on you. No taxes, no social security, nothing but cash.”

“That’s not—”

“Look,” Axel cut me off, “you can’t always be following the letter of the law, especially around here. Marluxia might be taking advantage of you—and all of us, frankly—but you spend enough time ringing up condoms at Kmart, and you’ll learn to appreciate a job like this. You’ll get all your timesheet shit worked out soon enough, but for now, you just have to show up and shut up. Or would you rather apply anywhere else down the street and go through a background check, a drug test, an interview, get shitty hours, and be part of a corporation’s dystopian attempt to revolutionize convenience stores and casual dining?”

I was silent for a moment. “Jesus,” I whispered.

“Just take your fucking cut and dip.”

“Do you even know my name yet?” I shot back.

Axel crossed his arms and leaned forward, closer toward me. For having worked an entire shift, his eyeliner still looked perfect—not that I was any expert, but when one of your exes is a girl who makes “lifestyle” videos on the internet, you find yourself learning a thing or two.

“Why should I care? You’re not gonna last a week here. This is a dive bar, not a fucking tech startup. Take your team-building attitude and shove it up your ass.”

“Knock it off,” I heard a voice behind me say. I whipped around to see one of the waitresses behind me, one hand on her slender hip. She had piercing blue eyes and slicked-back blonde hair, with two wiry tendrils sticking up from behind her temples.

“No one cares about your fucking bleeding heart, Axel,” she said, wrinkling her nose in disgust at the bartender. “I hate new kids too, but I hate hearing your bitchin’ more.”

Axel didn’t seem offended by the waitress’s comments; instead, he just rolled his eyes and straightened up. “Maybe if you learned to listen to people’s bitching more, you’d make better tips,” he said. “Speaking of which, here’s your cut for the night. Should be enough to stave off the loneliness and depression for one more night.” He pulled an envelope from behind the register and reached over me to give it to her.

“Oh ha ha, Axel,” she replied, snatching the envelope out of his long fingers. “Fuck off and die.”

As she turned around on her Doc Martens to leave, Axel blew a little kiss in her direction. Luckily—I guess—she didn’t see the gesture and instead sauntered over to Marluxia’s office, which she slipped inside.

Axel turned back to me, now holding another envelope. He grabbed my wrist and pushed the envelope into my palm, then crushed my fingers around it in his own warm grip.

“See you tomorrow.”

“But Marluxia didn’t—”

“Just show up.”

I nodded and, flustered by every single answer I’d been given than night, slipped around the back of the bar and into the kitchen, where I’d left my jacket.

I stayed in the kitchen for a bit longer, unsatisfied with the work I’d done cleaning up. Xaldin and I hadn’t exchanged many words throughout the night, but at one point he had mentioned that working back of house wasn’t his usual position; his preference was to work as a bouncer, especially on nights when most of the servers were women. I later learned that this was not because the waitresses needed protection; rather, Marluxia saw a need for someone strong enough to drag and throw the unconscious bodies of people who had dared get too grabby.

Once I’d poked around the kitchen a bit longer and wiped down a few more surfaces, I decided to leave through the front rather than the back of the building, even though I was closer to the back door. Even the few extra seconds of warmth it would afford me seemed overwhelmingly worth it.

I turned off the lights in the kitchen and scullery, and with Axel’s damp apron hanging over one of my shoulders, I made my way back to the front of house.

Axel was still at the bar, hunched over the cash register. He had put on a cozy-looking black sherpa jacket with a red trim. The warm glow of the string lights above weren’t enough to light whatever he was looking at, so he had his phone out and was using it as a flashlight as he rifled through stacks of cash with one hand.

I was confused as to why Axel was still counting money. Sure, I’d only worked two shifts so far, but I knew there was no reason it should take longer than a few minutes to count up all the cash in the register. Curious, I hung back behind the bar, my eyes trained on Axel’s spindly fingers.

Which means I saw it.

I saw him tuck a sizable portion of cash into the pocket of his jacket.

My first instinct was, honestly, to excuse it—the banks were obviously closed, but maybe Axel just wanted to make a deposit at whatever bank the Peculiar River used for its business. It could also be that Axel was just cashing himself out using smaller bills. For all I know, he could be the only one allowed to use the register.

But, as with most things in my life, fate only believed in delivering to me the worst possible outcome.

Axel turned around.


	3. Daddy

The moment that Axel curled his lips back into a scowl was the moment I shoved my hands into my pockets, which I foolishly hoped would make me look more casual, as though I hadn’t been spying. Nothing to see here, just an idiot with some fun-sized candy wrappers in his pockets.

“So,” Axel said, his tone icy, “the white-trash Babysitter’s Club thought he’d drop in.”

“I’m not white trash.”

“I suppose you think you can just run to Marluxia and tell him I’m a thief?” Axel asked. His already slim eyes narrowed more. “Or are you going to use this against me?”

“I just...I’m not going to tell anyone. I just want to know if you’re, y’know, outright stealing,” I answered. “Honestly, if you hadn’t gotten so defensive, I probably would have assumed you were just doing business for the bar.”

Incensed, Axel grabbed a highball glass and flung it at me. I had decent reflexes from skateboarding (I know, the lamest reason ever), so I was able to dodge the attack, though I did trip and crash into the side of the bar, sending one of the bar stools clattering to the ground. The highball glass survived the throw; it struck the wall and bounced onto the ground, rolling across the floor.

“You don’t know a damn thing about me,” Axel said, his voice low.

“You’re right, but here’s something I want you to know about me—I’m not interested in fucking with you or ruining your life,” I said, my voice calm. “Trust me, blackmail is the last thing I’d wish on you. You just need to  _chill out for a second_.”

Axel slammed the register closed, turning to face me completely. His chest was rising and falling rapidly with anger.

“You should have left by now.”

“I don’t mind walking in the cold,” I said. “I live nearby.”

“You really must be white trash, then,” Axel spit. “No one lives in these hills. You want to get eaten by a bear one day?”

“Depends on whether or not I survive the next five minutes here with you.”

Axel cracked a smirk. Good to know that the idea of my body being ripped apart—especially by a wild animal—gave him some kind of joy.

“How long have you been, uh, doing this?” I asked, gesturing toward the register. “Seriously, I’m not going to tell anyone,” I added, seeing Axel’s stance stiffen. Even his spiky hair seemed to bristle like an alarmed animal’s quills.

“For someone who had a glass thrown at his head just now, you sure do seem to be awfully comfortable asking the questions here,” Axel said. “Honestly, this is only the second time I’ve done this. And if you ask me ‘why,’ I’ll probably throw something a lot heavier at your big head.”

“Is your head just small under all that hair?” I joked. Axel didn’t laugh.

We stood in silence for a beat. I realized that no one had bothered to turn the speakers off yet, which were playing a Wolfmother song from the last decade.

Feeling weirdly embarrassed, I started, “Hey, maybe we should—” but Axel cut me off.

“I’ll add your name to the timesheet. And the schedule,” he said coldly.

“I didn’t—”

“That’s all you’re gonna get out of me,” he said, his shoulders relaxing as he crossed his spindly arms over his chest. “You’re not the first asshole I’ve made arrangements with here. There’s a reason Zexion is the only one allowed to make any changes to the piss-poor menu.” He smiled, as though amused by a joke only he knew about.

“Ah, yeah, I’m a vegetarian, and I—”

“We got a deal?” Axel asked, raising his straight, red eyebrows.

“Look, I wouldn’t have told anyone in the first place. I mean, I appreciate the gesture, but you can trust me, you know.”

Axel shook his head. “Don’t know the meaning of the word. And you’re still being awful friendly toward someone who’d still like to lock you in the fucking freezer overnight.”

He laughed when I took a timid step back.

“Always be on your guard around here. Not that I expect you to last more than a week. Like I said yesterday—I have a habit of burning through busboys and barbacks. You’re not any different.”

“Didn’t know it was you personally who was responsible for that. I assume they never got their hourly wages either?”

Axel scratched the back of his head, rolling his eyes. For someone so tall, his posture was almost always terrible. His body seemed so long, it bent at his waist, pitching his spiky, intimidating head forward in the direction of whoever decided to make trouble across from him at the bar. His movements were swift and deliberate, despite his lanky appearance. I doubt I was the first person he’d ever thrown a glass at.

I made my way to the front door, zipping my jacket up to my chin and preparing for the icy night air.

Axel called after me, “Just because you’re the kid of a representative doesn’t mean you get to call the shots around here, you know. Unless you’ve got some kind of law degree rotting away in whatever shack you’re living in.”

My stomach dropped, and I fought back a sudden, instinctive wave of nausea. My ears felt hot.

“What are you talking about?”

I heard him jingle keys in his pocket. “It’s cold. You want a ride home? Wouldn’t want the representative’s son to catch a cold.”

I turned around just in time to glimpse Axel’s slouching frame slip into the back of the bar, the door clicking softly shut behind him. For a moment I stood frozen, my throat tight, fists clenched in the pockets of my jacket.

What cover I thought I’d had was now officially blown—by easily the worst person possible.

Axel didn’t blow covers, I figured. He incinerated them.

 

* * *

 

I had an email the next morning.

I wasn’t a new writing assignment for a dead blog or an overdraft notice from my bank. Instead, it was an automatic rejection from a job I’d applied to in a frenzy the night before, within moments of walking in the door after my encounter with Axel.

My head foggy with rage and confusion, I had applied to about five different jobs in the Boone area—at the university, at medical offices, even at another bar. I had to leave the Peculiar River, and I had to leave it now.

I had pretty much accepted on that day that I wouldn’t be returning to work ever again. No use going through the steps of submitting a two weeks’ notice when Marluxia would be the last person I would ever use as a referral in my life. I’d sooner ask my tenth-grade driving instructor.

As the day passed, though, I began to feel a little bad. I thought about the severe woman who had confronted Axel the other day and Xaldin, who seemed to begrudgingly appreciate the help I had offered on a busy November night.

I decided that my best course of action would be to give the bar a call and tell Marluxia that, hey, I appreciated all that he’d done for me over the past few days, but this wasn’t going to work out. I had a sick grandma. I had gotten into college (again). I had gotten a girl pregnant. My incredibly lucrative online business was becoming a full-time job, and without me managing orders, how would the people of Boone get their leggings and energy tea needs met?

The phone rang for a long time, much longer than it had any business ringing at four in the afternoon. I was curled up on the couch, an animal documentary playing on the TV in front of me. All I needed was some curry and a diet Sprite, and I’d be pretty much set for the night, blissfully unemployed and practicing self-care. I could even color my nails with Sharpie; self-care always means doing something with your nails, right?

“HI, this is the Peculiar River.” The voice on the line sounded unfamiliar to me; it had a thick Californian accent I never expected to encounter in the Appalachians. “What can I do ya for today?”

“Hi, ah, my name’s Roxas—”

“Oh, new guy!” the voice exclaimed. “Far out. Been hearing all about ya. Heard you were working tonight—good thing, too. Buncha people coming out after the concert.”

“What?”

“No way you didn’t hear! Buncha hipsters are in town for some music thing. Indie rock and folk, that kinda thing. Cringey YouTube acoustic guitar shit. Anyway, they’re doing a bar crawl, and PR’s on it.”

“Oh, ah, well, I was actually calling about—”

“Don’t worry about it,” the voice interrupted again. “Zexion’s in tonight, and he and Lexaeus are gonna be working the kitchen. You’ll be front of house.”

“I...will?”

“Yeah. Barback.”

I felt the nausea creep up inside me again. The bar not only meant being in front of a lot of people, helping to assemble drinks that I knew nothing about, it also meant a huge, red problem.

“But I don’t know how—”

“Way ahead of ya. Don’t worry, you’ll do fine, and I could really use the help.”

“You…?”

“Bar’s mine tonight, bud. Told Axel to take a hike. He could use a day off, anyway. Six days a week is just criminal. Besides, I’ll let you in on a little secret.” Even though I had no idea what the face of the person on the phone looked like, I could mentally picture his eyes sparkling. “Axel is a chronic overserver. Thinks it’ll get him better tips. He’s a fucking dumbass—I always make more than him. And tonight you’ll get a piece of the pie!”

The voice sounded so enthusiastic, there was no way I could possibly quit like this. I felt my head ache with regret and with the knowledge that I would have to scrape myself off my couch and trudge through the woods, in the biting cold, to get to work, where I’d be under enormous stress for the entire night.

But Axel wouldn’t be there. Axel wouldn’t be there, and I could use the money.

“Plus,” the voice added, “Axel filled me in on your whole deal.”

“My...my what?” I felt myself tense up again.

“Yeah. Don’t tell him I told you, but he mentioned something about you having big ‘ol doe eyes. Which means we’ll make even more tonight, what with all the ladies who are goo-goo for that acoustic shit everywhere. Anyway, get your ass up here soon; we’ve got shit to do!”

He hung up. I stared at the screen of my phone, smeared a bit with the oil from my face. Another notification had popped up in my notifications panel—another rejection email. Seconds later, it was followed by a notification that I’d missed a payment on a credit card I had completely forgotten about. A few more days without paying, and my account would be turned over to collections. Collections meant calls to my parents.

I swallowed the lump in my throat the best that I could and flung myself dramatically off the couch. Axel’s apron was hanging to dry in my bathroom, over the curtain rod. Time to see if his pathetically small waist really was tinier than my own.

 

* * *

 

“I live by the philosophy of ‘ABR’ when I’m working the bar,” Xigbar was telling me about an hour later. “Always—be—refilling.”

“But I thought you said you didn’t like that Axel overserves?” I asked, biting the side of my finger. I’d gotten a wicked splinter on my own back door on the way to work and was still nursing the site of the injury. The splinter, just a gray speck under my skin, pulsed with pain.

“Nah, he does overserve, and that’s why Marluxia and every barback we’ve ever had hate him,” Xigbar answered, shaking his head. He wore an eyepatch over one eye and also had an enormous scar across the side of his face. His long black hair, streaked with gray, was pulled into a low ponytail at the nape of his neck. Xigbar was, to put it bluntly, the coolest fucking person I’d ever met in my entire life. “He goes through bottles of liquor like crazy. That’s no way to run a bar. Here, see how this bottle is half-full?” He motioned toward a bottle of gin. “If this were Axel’s bar tonight, you’d already be gearing up to replace that bottle, like, now.” He shook his head, his one golden eye closing with shame at the thought of wasting so much alcohol. “Axel thinks of himself as a charity, but he’s ruining half the livers in this town.”

I don’t know much about making drinks, but if Axel was an example of someone who ruined livers, Xigbar couldn’t possibly have been  _that_ conservative with his mixes. I spent most of the night tossing empty liquor bottles out of the way, and at one point, Marluxia had to make an order to a local brewery to get more beer delivered. Indie music fans love local beer, it turns out.

The bar was packed with people by midnight, and despite the chill outside, my face was glowing and my skin was coated in a thin layer of sweat. I wiped my face with my shirt, which made Xigbar laugh when he saw how smooth my chest was.

“You sure you’re old enough to be serving, kid?”

My already-red faced burned with embarrassment as a few people seated around the bar laughed. I had spent the night trying to ignore most of the customers, unless they were trying to flag me down to cash out. Being a barback meant that I was virtually invisible, and my short stature compared to Xigbar’s wasn’t helping matters.

“You’d think with his parents’ connections, he could afford to lift a weight or two.”

I spun around, knocking over a few empty bottles of beer that had been sitting on the bar as I did so.

“What the fuck!” Xigbar whined. I didn’t hear him. I was looking at Axel.

Parked comfortably between two other people, Axel was seated at the far end of the bar, his face mostly shadowed except for his pointy nose and shining green eyes. To his left was a young man with shaggy brown hair and a serious expression. To his right was a beautiful young woman with short blue hair and a sweatshirt from App State. That Axel had friends—particularly normal-looking ones—was surprising. I gave them both jealous glares.

“Something I can help you with?” I asked.

“Whoa, whoa, is that the tone Xigbar taught you to use on the clock?” Axel said with a sarcastic sigh. “Shoulda kept you in the back of house, where you can’t knock shit over. You got an ear infection or what?”

This spurned a laugh out of the girl, who covered her mouth politely and gave me a sympathetic look.

“Shoulda kept you back of house, where your unfunny jokes might land better,” I said. I felt a firm hand on my shoulder, as Xigbar dragged me back to the middle of the bar, where empty bottles of vodka sat waiting to be taken care of.

“Never was good with puppies,” Xigbar said, looking at Axel. “Least he ain’t cryin’, which is more than I can say for any barback you’ve ever worked with.”

Axel rolled his eyes. “I was never a dick to Xion.”

While Xigbar and Axel bickered, I snuck another glance at the people huddled around Axel. Was the girl his girlfriend? She had a gentle smile and slender, beautiful hands. Unless she was leaning over to Axel or their other companion, she sat perfectly still, her movements precise and graceful. If it weren’t for the beer in her hands, I would have bet she’d never had a drop of alcohol in her life.

“Maybe give the kid a break,” I heard Xigbar say as I crouched down to the beer fridge, rummaging around for no reason so that Axel wouldn’t see my red face. “He’s doing fine. Anyway, I’ve got a bar to run.”

Xigbar went back to mixing drinks one of the servers had just put in for a table, grumbling about how people only drink Long Islands if they have no appreciation for liquor. Axel must have turned back to his friends, as I heard him address the girl—Aqua—next.

“Hey Aqua,” he began, “you happen to have any opinion about Representative Ven?”

I swallowed the lump in my throat, desperate to remain turned away from Axel and his conversation. I pressed a bottle of beer to my face, which was stinging with heat from my rage.

“Oh, don’t get me started,” Aqua moaned. “He’s like, movie levels of evil. Who pulls funding from medical charities?”

Under my breath, I started counting back from ten.

“What about you, Terra?” Axel droned. I heard his glass clink as he knocked it against the glass of the man next to him. “Any thoughts?”

“Nothing good—I happen to think mental health is actually an important issue worthy of compassion and adequate education,” Terra answered. His voice was as serious as his expression had been. “‘Course, we don’t have to ask your opinion on the subject, Axel.”

“I just wonder how the people around the Rep can possibly live with themselves,” Axel said. “Can’t imagine calling someone ‘Daddy’ who is fine with the slaughter of other people’s dads.”

“As though you’d call  _anyone_ ‘Daddy,’” Aqua said, giggling.

“I can think of someone who calls Rep Ven Daddy,” Axel said. I felt something bounce off my neck and turned around to see that Axel had chucked a crumpled-up napkin at me. I snatched the napkin off the floor and squeezed it in my fist, my fingernails digging into my palms. My eyes watered—whether from the pain or from fury, I couldn’t tell.

Aqua attempted to change the subject to her upcoming biology exams, but all sounds bounced around in my head like tin cans tossed around inside a metal pipe. Without even thinking, I flung myself over to the end of the bar where Axel and his friends were sitting. I didn’t even realize I had his glass in my hand until rum was flying into Axel’s face, making his expression twist into a scowl and his eyes squeeze shut.

Terra had my shirt in his grip within seconds, and I felt myself being pulled over the bar like a rag doll, my legs kicking behind me. I could hear Xigbar hissing my name from behind me, and silence seemed to descend upon the bar as everyone turned to watch me.

“What the fuck is your problem?” Terra said, his breath smelling heavily of vodka.

“Ask Axel,” I spat—literally, spat, right into Terra’s face. He flung me back, and I landed on my ass on the floor, knocking over about five or six bottles of liquor as I did so. Someone flung a drink at me, and I sprang to my feet, reflexively grabbing a bottle of beer and smashing it against the side of the bar. What I thought I was going to do with a jagged beer bottle, I’m not sure, but at least I didn’t look like the defenseless wet rat I felt like.

Marluxia descended upon the scene, his mouth a straight line and he walked behind the bar and grabbed the fabric of my shirt at the nape of my neck. He dragged me like a kitten back to his office, while bar patrons mumbled their thanks and appreciation as he passed their crowded tables.

Flinging open the door to his office, Marluxia let go of my shirt long enough to grab a handful of my dripping-wet hair and yank me inside. He slammed the door behind us before pushing me down onto the floor. My head smacked against the hardwood, and my skull pulsed with pain as the bar manager placed his foot—clad in a black cowboy boot—on the center of my chest, his heel digging into my solar plexus.

“After tonight, you’ll never take one fucking dainty little step into this bar ever again.”


End file.
